The Foo Fighters support it, Metallica loathes it, and the final legal brief has yet to be written about it. One thing is certain, however: Napster has changed the face of computing by ushering in a peer-to-peer revolution. Although peer-to-peer is nothing new, Napster has broken the mold by being so easy to use. After downloading the small (beta) client, users can connect to Napster's remote servers and share music with vast numbers of other users. While connected, users can search and download the shared MP3s of every other connected user.

Napster's popularity has grown astonishingly, rapidly making millions into believers in the peer-to-peer model, and has done so in such a simple and elegant way that many of its staunchest defenders don't even know what "peer-to-peer" means. Napster has made an entire level of connectivity available to those who would never have bothered with clunky old FTP applications.

The results speak for themselves: At any given time users can access as many as 6 terabytes of MP3s, representing upwards of a million songs in thousands of user databases. The ethics and legality of the servicewhich may be skirting copyright laws and bilking the recording industry out of royaltiesare open to question, but the impact and influence of this revolutionary service are not. And make no mistake, it is a revolution. Even if Napster folds because of legal rulings and financial penalties, its imitators (like Gnutella) will certainly build on what Napster began. And since many of these alternatives offer true peer-to-peer functionality (with no centralized servers), shutting them down will be virtually impossible. (Napster Inc., www.napster.com)

Winner: Napster

Winner: Napster

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